Produced by Al Haines.
[Illustration: Portrait of the Author--Edward William Thomson]
*Old Man Savarin Stories*
_Tales of Canada and Canadians_
BY
EDWARD WILLIAM THOMSON
F.R.S.L. (United Kingdom)
F.R.S. (Canada)
ILLUSTRATED BY
CHARLES W. JEFFERYS
TORONTO :: :: :: S. B. GUNDY
PUBLISHER IN CANADA FOR HUMPHREY MILFORD
COPYRIGHT, 1917
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO
SIR A. T. QUILLER-COUCH
WHO
"GAVE ME THE GOOD WORD"
IN SEASON
"I'VE A FRIEND OVER THE SEA"
My thanks are here due to Messrs. T. Y. Crowell & Co., N. Y., for
liberty to include in this volume sundry stories from "Old Man Savarin";
to the American Baptist Publication Society, Philadelphia, for liberty
to include "Dour Davie's Drive," and "Petherick's Peril"; to the
University Magazine, Montreal, for liberty to include "Miss Minnely's
Management"; to the Century Company, N. Y., for liberty to include "The
Swartz Diamond."
E. W. THOMSON
*CONTENTS*
The Canadian Abroad
Privilege of the Limits
The Waterloo Veteran
John Bedell, U. E. Loyalist
Old Man Savarin
Great Godfrey's Lament
McGrath's Bad Night
Shining Cross of Rigaud
Dour Davie's Drive
Petherick's Peril
Little Baptiste
Red-Headed Windego
The Ride By Night
"Drafted"
A Turkey Apiece
The Swartz Diamond
Boss of the World
Miss Minnely's Management
*ILLUSTRATIONS*
Portrait of the Author . . . . . . . . . Frontispiece
He knocked the two of them over with the post
Old John marched in full regimentals
Dey's fight like dat for more as four hours
We stood looking at my father's white face
My leg is broke
Back and forward they dashed
Baptiste and Jawnny looked at the place in the wildest terror
Absalom sprang up, staggered, shouted
*OLD MAN SAVARIN STORIES*
__
_THE CANADIAN ABROAD_
_When the croon of a rapid is heard on the breeze,_
_With the scent of a pine-forest gloom,_
_Or the edge of the sky is of steeple-top trees,_
_Set in hazes of blueberry bloom,_
_Or a song-sparrow sudden from quietness trills_
_His delicate anthem to me,_
_Then my heart hurries home to the Ottawa hills,_
_Wherever I happen to be._
_When the veils of a shining lake vista unfold,_
_Or the mist towers dim from a fall,_
_Or a woodland is blazing in crimson and gold,_
_Or a snow-shroud is covering all,_
_Or there's honking of geese in the darkening sky,_
_When the spring sets hepatica free,_
_Then my heart's winging north as they never can fly,_
_Wherever I happen to be._
_When the swallows slant curves of bewildering joy_
_As the cool of the twilight descends,_
_And rosy-cheek maiden and hazel-hue boy_
_Listen grave while the Angelus ends_
_In a tremulous flow from the bell of a shrine,_
_Then a faraway mountain I see,_
_And my soul is in Canada's evening shine,_
_Wherever my body may be._
*PRIVILEGE OF THE LIMITS*
"Yes, indeed, my grandfather wass once in jail," said old Mrs. McTavish,
of the county of Glengarry, in Ontario, Canada; "but that wass for debt,
and he wass a ferry honest man whateffer, and he would not broke his
promise--no, not for all the money in Canada. If you will listen to me,
I will tell chust exactly the true story about that debt, to show you
what an honest man my grandfather wass.
"One time Tougal Stewart, him that wass the poy's grandfather that keeps
the same store in Cornwall to this day, sold a plough to my grandfather,
and my grandfather said he would pay half the plough in October, and the
other half whateffer time he felt able to pay the money. Yes, indeed,
that was the very promise my grandfather gave.
"So he was at Tougal Stewart's store on the first of October early in
the morning pef ore the shutters wass taken off, and he paid half chust
exactly to keep his word. Then the crop wass ferry pad next year, and
the year after that one of his horses wass killed py lightning, and the
next year his brother, that wass not rich and had a big family, died,
and do you think wass my grandfather to let the family be disgraced
without a good funeral? No, indeed. So my grandfather paid for the
funeral, and there was at it plenty of meat and drink for eferypody, as
wass the right Hielan' custom those days; and after the funeral my
grandfather did not feel chust exactly able to pay the other half for
the plough that year either.
"So, then, Tougal Stewart met my grandfather in Cornwall next day after
the funeral, and asked him if he had some money to spare.
"'Wass you in need of help, Mr. Stewart?' says my grandfather, kindly.
'For if it's in any want you are, Tougal,' says my grandfather, 'I will
sell the coat off my back, if there is no other way to lend you a loan';
for that wass always the way of my grandfather with all his friends, and
a bigger-hearted man there never wass in all Glengarry, or in Stormont,
or in Dundas, moreofer.
"'In want!' says Tougal--'in want, Mr. McTavish!' says he, very high.
'Would you wish to insult a gentleman, and him of the name of Stewart,
that's the name of princes of the world?' he said, so he did.
"Seeing Tougal had his temper up, my grandfather spoke softly, being a
quiet, peaceable man, and in wonder what he had said to offend Tougal.
"'Mr. Stewart,' says my grandfather, 'it wass not in my mind to anger
you whatefer. Only I thought, from your asking me if I had some money,
that you might be looking for a wee bit of a loan, as many a gentleman
has to do at times, and no shame to him at all,' said my grandfather.
"'A loan?' says Tougal, sneering. 'A loan, is it? Where's your memory,
Mr. McTavish? Are you not owing me half the price of the plough you've
had these three years?'
"'And wass you asking me for money for the other half of the plough?'
says my grandfather, very astonished.
"'Just that,' says Tougal.
"'Have you no shame or honor in you?' says my grandfather, firing up.
'How could I feel able to pay that now, and me chust yesterday been
giving my poor brother a funeral fit for the McTavishes' own
grand-nephew, that wass as good chentleman's plood as any Stewart in
Glengarry. You saw the expense I wass at, for there you wass, and I
thank you for the politeness of coming, Mr. Stewart,' says my
grandfather, ending mild, for the anger would never stay in him more
than a minute, so kind was the nature he had.
"'If you can spend money on a funeral like that, you can pay me for my
plough,' says Stewart; for with buying and selling he wass become a poor
creature, and the heart of a Hielan'man wass half gone out of him, for
all he wass so proud of his name of monarchs and kings.
"My grandfather had a mind to strike him down on the spot, so he often
said; but he thought of the time when he hit Hamish Cochrane in anger,
and he minded the penances the priest put on him for breaking the silly
man's jaw with that blow, so he smothered the heat that wass in him, and
turned away in scorn. With that Tougal Stewart went to court, and sued
my grandfather, puir mean creature.
"You might think that Judge Jones--him that wass judge in Cornwall
before Judge Jarvis that's dead--would do justice. But no, he made it
the law that my grandfather must pay at once, though Tougal Stewart
could not deny what the bargain wass.
"'Your Honor,' says my grandfather, 'I said I'd pay when I felt able.
And do I feel able now? No, I do not,' says he. 'It's a disgrace to
Tougal Stewart to ask me, and himself telling you what the bargain
wass,' said my grandfather. But Judge Jones said that he must pay, for
all that he did not feel able.
"'I will nefer pay one copper till I feel able,' says my grandfather;
'but I'll keep my Hielan' promise to my dying day, as I always done,'
says he.
"And with that the old judge laughed, and said he would have to give
judgment. And so he did; and after that Tougal Stewart got out an
execution. But not the worth of a handful of oatmeal could the bailiff
lay hands on, because my grandfather had chust exactly taken the
precaution to give a bill of sale on his gear to his neighbor, Alexander
Frazer, that could be trusted to do what was right after the law play
was over.
"The whole settlement had great contempt for Tougal Stewart's conduct;
but he wass a headstrong body, and once he begun to do wrong against my
grandfather, he held on, for all that his trade fell away; and finally
he had my grandfather arrested for debt, though you'll understand, sir,
that he was owing Stewart nothing that he ought to pay when he didn't
feel able.
"In those times prisoners for debt wass taken to jail in Cornwall, and
if they had friends to give bail that they would not go beyond the posts
that wass around the sixteen acres nearest the jail walls, the prisoners
could go where they liked on that ground. This was called 'the
privilege of the limits.' The limits, you'll understand, wass marked by
cedar posts painted white about the size of hitching-posts.
"The whole settlement wass ready to go bail for my grandfather if he
wanted it, and for the health of him he needed to be in the open air,
and so he gave Tuncan Macdonnell of the Greenfields, and AEneas
Macdonald of the Sandfields, for his bail, and he promised, on his
Hielan' word of honor, not to go beyond the posts. With that he went
where he pleased, only taking care that he never put even the toe of his
foot beyond a post, for all that some prisoners of the limits would
chump ofer them and back again, or maybe swing round them, holding by
their hands.
"Efery day the neighbors would go into Cornwall to give my grandfather
the good word, and they would offer to pay Tougal Stewart for the other
half of the plough, only that vexed my grandfather, for he wass too
proud to borrow, and, of course, every day he felt less and less able to
pay on account of him having to hire a man to be doing the spring
ploughing and seeding and making the kale-yard.
"All this time, you'll mind, Tougal Stewart had to pay five shillings a
week for my grandfather's keep, the law being so that if the debtor
swore he had not five pounds' worth of property to his name, then the
creditor had to pay the five shillings, and, of course, my grandfather
had nothing to his name after he gave the bill of sale to Alexander
Frazer. A great diversion it was to my grandfather to be reckoning up
that if he lived as long as his father, that was hale and strong at
ninety-six, Tougal would need to pay five or six hundred pounds for him,
and there was only two pound five shillings to be paid on the plough.
"So it was like that all summer, my grandfather keeping heartsome, with
the neighbors coming in so steady to bring him the news of the
settlement. There he would sit, just inside one of the posts, for to
pass his jokes, and tell what he wished the family to be doing next.
This way it might have kept going on for forty years, only it came about
that my grand-father's youngest child--him that was my father--fell
sick, and seemed like to die.
"Well, when my grandfather heard that bad news, he wass in a terrible
way, to be sure, for he would be longing to hold the child in his arms,
so that his heart was sore and like to break. Eat he could not, sleep
he could not: all night he would be groaning, and all day he would be
walking around by the posts, wishing that he had not passed his Hielan'
word of honor not to go beyond a post; for he thought how he could have
broken out like a chentleman, and gone to see his sick child, if he had
stayed inside the jail wall. So it went on three days and three nights
pefore the wise thought came into my grandfather's head to show him how
he need not go beyond the posts to see his little sick poy. With that
he went straight to one of the white cedar posts, and pulled it up out
of the hole, and started for home, taking great care to carry it in his
hands pefore him, so he would not be beyond it one bit.
"My grandfather wass not half a mile out of Cornwall, which was only a
little place in those days, when two of the turnkeys came after him.
"'Stop, Mr. McTavish,' says the turnkeys.
"'What for would I stop?' says my grandfather.
"'You have broke your bail,' says they.
"'It's a lie for you,' says my grandfather, for his temper flared up for
anybody to say he would broke his bail. 'Am I beyond the post?' says my
grandfather.
"With that they run in on him, only that he knocked the two of them over
with the post, and went on rejoicing, like an honest man should, at
keeping his word and overcoming them that would slander his good name.
The only thing pesides thoughts of the child that troubled him was
questioning whether he had been strictly right in turning round for to
use the post to defend himself in such a way that it was nearer the jail
than what he wass. But when he remembered how the jailer never
complained of prisoners of the limits chumping ofer the posts, if so
they chumped back again in a moment, the trouble went out of his mind.
[Illustration: HE KNOCKED THE TWO OF THEM OVER WITH THE POST]
"Pretty soon after that he met Tuncan Macdonnell of Greenfields, coming
into Cornwall with the wagon.
"'And how is this, Glengatchie?' says Tuncan. 'For you were never the
man to broke your bail.'
"Glengatchie, you'll understand, sir, is the name of my grandfather's
farm.
"'Never fear, Greenfields,' says my grandfather, 'for I'm not beyond the
post.'
"So Greenfields looked at the post, and he looked at my grandfather, and
he scratched his head a wee, and he seen it was so; and then he fell
into a great admiration entirely.
"'Get in with me, Glengatchie--it's proud I'll be to carry you home';
and he turned his team around. My grandfather did so, taking great care
to keep the post in front of him all the time; and that way he reached
home. Out comes my grandmother running to embrace him; but she had to
throw her arms around the post and my grandfather's neck at the same
time, he was that strict to be within his promise. Pefore going ben the
house, he went to the back end of the kale-yard which was farthest from
the jail, and there he stuck the post; and then he went back to see his
sick child, while all the neighbors that came round was glad to see what
a wise thought the saints had put into his mind to save his bail and his
promise.
"So there he stayed a week till my father got well. Of course the
constables came after my grandfather, but the settlement would not let
the creatures come within a mile of Glengatchie. You might think, sir,
that my grandfather would have stayed with his wife and weans, seeing
the post was all the time in the kale-yard, and him careful not to go
beyond it; but he was putting the settlement to a great deal of trouble
day and night to keep the constables off, and he was fearful that they
might take the post away, if ever they got to Glengatchie, and give him
the name of false, that no McTavish ever had. So Tuncan Greenfields and
AEneas Sandfield drove my grandfather back to the jail, him with the
post behind him in the wagon, so as he would be between it and the jail.
Of course Tougal Stewart tried his best to have the bail declared
forfeited; but old Judge Jones only laughed, and said my grandfather was
a Hielan' gentleman, with a very nice sense of honor, and that was chust
exactly the truth.
"How did my grandfather get free in the end? Oh, then, that was because
of Tougal Stewart being careless--him that thought he knew so much of
the law. The law was, you will mind, that Tougal had to pay five
shillings a week for keeping my grandfather in the limits. The money
wass to be paid efery Monday, and it wass to be paid in lawful money of
Canada, too. Well, would you belief that Tougal paid in four shillings
in silver one Monday, and one shilling in coppers, for he took up the
collection in church the day pefore, and it wass not till Tougal had
gone away that the jailer saw that one of the coppers was a Brock
copper,--a medal, you will understand, made at General Brock's death,
and not lawful money of Canada at all. With that the jailer came out to
my grandfather.
"'Mr. McTavish,' says he, taking off his hat, 'you are a free man, and
I'm glad of it.' Then he told him what Tougal had done.
"'I hope you will not have any hard feelings toward me, Mr. McTavish,'
said the jailer; and a decent man he wass, for all that there wass not a
drop of Hielan' blood in him. 'I hope you will not think hard of me for
not being hospitable to you, sir,' says he; 'but it's against the rules
and regulations for the jailer to be offering the best he can command to
the prisoners. Now that you are free, Mr. McTavish,' says the jailer,
'I would be a proud man if Mr. McTavish of Glengatchie would do me the
honor of taking supper with me this night. I will be asking your leave
to invite some of the gentlemen of the place, if you will say the word,
Mr. McTavish,' says he.
"Well, my grandfather could never bear malice, the kind man he was, and
he seen how bad the jailer felt, so he consented, and a great company
came in, to be sure, to celebrate the occasion.
"Did my grandfather pay the balance on the plough? What for should you
suspicion, sir, that my grandfather would refuse his honest debt? Of
course he paid for the plough, for the crop was good that fall.
"'I would be paying you the other half of the plough now, Mr. Stewart,'
says my grandfather, coming in when the store was full.
"'Hoich, but YOU are the honest McTavish!' says Tougal, sneering.
"But my grandfather made no answer to the creature, for he thought it
would be unkind to mention how Tougal had paid out six pounds four
shillings and eleven pence to keep him in on account of a debt of two
pound five that never was due till it was paid."
*THE WATERLOO VETERAN*
Is Waterloo a dead word to you? the name of a plain of battle, no more?
Or do you see, on a space of rising ground, the little long-coated man
with marble features, and unquenchable eyes that pierce through rolling
smoke to where the relics of the old Guard of France stagger and rally
and reach fiercely again up the hill of St. Jean toward the squares,
set, torn, red, re-formed, stubborn, mangled, victorious beneath the
unflinching will of him behind there,--the Iron Duke of England?
Or is your interest in the fight literary? and do you see in a pause of
the conflict Major O'Dowd sitting on the carcass of Pyramus refreshing
himself from that case-bottle of sound brandy? George Osborne lying
yonder, all his fopperies ended, with a bullet through his heart?
Rawdon Crawley riding stolidly behind General Tufto along the front of
the shattered regiment where Captain Dobbin stands heartsick for poor
Emily?
Or maybe the struggle arranges itself in your vision around one figure
not named in history or fiction,--that of hour grandfather, or his
father, or some old dead soldier of the great wars whose blood you exult
to inherit, or some grim veteran whom you saw tottering to the rollcall
beyond when Queen Victoria was young and you were a little boy.
For me the shadows of the battle are so grouped round old John Locke
that the historians, story-tellers, and painters may never quite
persuade me that he was not the centre and real hero of the action. The
French cuirassiers in my thought-pictures charge again and again vainly
against old John; he it is who breaks the New Guard; upon the ground
that he defends the Emperor's eyes are fixed all day long. It is John
who occasionally glances at the sky with wonder if Blucher has failed
them. Upon Shaw the Lifeguardsman, and John, the Duke plainly most
relies, and the words that Wellington actually speaks when the time
comes for advance are, "Up, John, and at them!"
How fate drifted the old veteran of Waterloo into our little Canadian
Lake Erie village I never knew. Drifted him? No; he ever marched as if
under the orders of his commander. Tall, thin, white-haired,
close-shaven, and always in knee-breeches and long stockings, his was an
antique and martial figure. "Fresh white-fish" was his cry, which he
delivered as if calling all the village to fall in for drill.
So impressive was his demeanor that he dignified his occupation. For
years after he disappeared, the peddling of white-fish by horse and cart
was regarded in that district as peculiarly respectable. It was a
glorious trade when old John Locke held the steelyards and served out
the glittering fish with an air of distributing ammunition for a long
day's combat.
I believe I noticed, on the first day I saw him, how he tapped his left
breast with a proud gesture when he had done with a lot of customers and
was about to march again at the head of his horse. That restored him
from trade to his soldiership--he had saluted his Waterloo medal! There
beneath his threadbare old blue coat it lay, always felt by the heart of
the hero.
"Why doesn't he wear it outside?" I once asked.
"He used to," said my father; "till Hiram Beaman, the druggist, asked
him what he'd 'take for the bit of pewter.'"
"What did old John say, sir?"
"'Take for the bit of pewter!' said he, looking hard at Beaman with
scorn. 'I've took better men's lives nor ever yours was for to get it,
and I'd sell my own for it as quick as ever I offered it before.'
"'More fool you,' said Beaman.
"'You're nowt,' said old John, very calm and cold, 'you're nowt but
walking dirt.' From that day forth he would never sell Beaman a fish;
he wouldn't touch his money."
It must have been late in 1854 or early in 1855 that I first saw the
famous medal. Going home from school on a bright winter afternoon, I
met old John walking very erect, without his usual fish-supply. A dull
round white spot was clasped on the left breast of his coat.
"Mr. Locke," said the small boy, staring with admiration, "is that your
glorious Waterloo medal?"
"You're a good little lad!" He stooped to let me see the noble pewter.
"War's declared against Rooshia, and now it's right to show it. The old
regiment's sailed, and my only son is with the colors."
Then he took me by the hand and led me into the village store, where the
lawyer read aloud the news from the paper that the veteran gave him. In
those days there was no railway within fifty miles of us. It had
chanced that some fisherman brought old John a later paper than any
previously received in the village.
"Ay, but the Duke is gone," said he, shaking his white head, "and it's
curious to be fighting on the same side with another Boney."
All that winter and the next, all the long summer between, old John
displayed his medal. When the report of Alma came, his remarks on the
French failure to get into the fight were severe. "What was they ever,
at best, without Boney?" he would inquire. But a letter from his son
after Inkermann changed all that.
"Half of us was killed, and the rest of us clean tired with fighting,"
wrote Corporal Locke. "What with a bullet through the flesh of my right
leg, and the fatigue of using the bayonet so long, I was like to drop.
The Russians was coming on again as if there was no end to them, when
strange drums came sounding in the mist behind us. With that we closed
up and faced half-round, thinking they had outflanked us and the day was
gone, so there was nothing more to do but make out to die hard, like the
sons of Waterloo men. You would have been pleased to see the looks of
what was left of the old regiment, father. Then all of a sudden a French
column came up the rise out of the mist, screaming, '_Vive l'Empereur!_'
their drums beating the charge. We gave them room, for we were too dead
tired to go first. On they went like mad at the Russians, so that was
the end of a hard morning's work. I was down,--fainted with loss of
blood,--but I will soon be fit for duty again. When I came to myself
there was a Frenchman pouring brandy down my throat, and talking in his
gibberish as kind as any Christian. Never a word will I say agin them
red-legged French again."
"Show me the man that would!" growled old John. "It was never in them
French to act cowardly. Didn't they beat all the world, and even stand
up many's the day agen ourselves and the Duke? They didn't beat,--it
wouldn't be in reason,--but they tried brave enough, and what more'd you
ask of mortal men?"
With the ending of the Crimean War our village was illuminated. Rows of
tallow candles in every window, fireworks in a vacant field, and a
torchlight procession! Old John marched at its head in full
regimentals, straight as a ramrod, the hero of the night. His son had
been promoted for bravery on the field. After John came a dozen gray
militiamen of Queenston Heights, Lundy's Lane, and Chippewa; next some
forty volunteers of '37. And we boys of the U. E. Loyalist settlement
cheered and cheered, thrilled with an intense vague knowledge that the
old army of Wellington kept ghostly step with John, while aerial
trumpets and drums pealed and beat with rejoicing at the fresh glory of
the race and the union of English-speaking men unconsciously celebrated
and symbolized by the little rustic parade.
[Illustration: OLD JOHN MARCHED IN FULL REGIMENTALS]
After that the old man again wore his medal concealed. The Chinese War
of 1857 was too contemptible to celebrate by displaying his badge of
Waterloo.
Then came the dreadful tale of the Sepoy mutiny--Meerut, Delhi,
Cawnpore! After the tale of Nana Sahib's massacre of women and children
was read to old John he never smiled, I think. Week after week, month
after month, as hideous tidings poured steadily in, his face became more
haggard, gray, and dreadful. The feeling that he was too old for use
seemed to shame him. He no longer carried his head high, as of yore.
That his son was not marching behind Havelock with the avenging army
seemed to cut our veteran sorely. Sergeant Locke had sailed with the
old regiment to join Outram in Persia before the Sepoys broke loose. It
was at this time that old John was first heard to say, "I'm 'feared
something's gone wrong with my heart."
Months went by before we learned that the troops for Persia had been
stopped on their way and thrown into India against the mutineers. At
that news old John marched into the village with a prouder air than he
had worn for many a day. His medal was again on his breast.
It was but the next month, I think, that the village lawyer stood
reading aloud the account of the capture of a great Sepoy fort. The
veteran entered the post-office, and all made way for him. The reading
went on:--
"The blowing open of the Northern Gate was the grandest personal exploit
of the attack. It was performed by native sappers, covered by the fire
of two regiments, and headed by Lieutenants Holder and Dacre, Sergeants
Green, Carmody, Macpherson, and Locke."
The lawyer paused. Every eye turned to the face of the old Waterloo
soldier. He straightened up to keener attention, threw out his chest,
and tapped the glorious medal in salute of the names of the brave.
"God be praised, my son was there!" he said. "Read on."
"Sergeant Carmody, while laying the powder, was killed, and the native
havildar wounded. The powder having been laid, the advance party
slipped down into the ditch to allow the firing party, under Lieutenant
Dacre, to do its duty. While trying to fire the charge he was shot
through one arm and leg. He sank, but handed the match to Sergeant
Macpherson, who was at once shot dead. Sergeant Locke, already wounded
severely in the shoulder, then seized the match, and succeeded in firing
the train. He fell at that moment, literally riddled with bullets."
"Read on," said old John, in a deeper voice. All forbore to look twice
upon his face.
"Others of the party were falling, when the gate was blown to fragments,
and the waiting regiments of infantry, under Colonel Campbell, rushed
into the breach."
There was a long silence in the post-office, till old John spoke once
more.
"The Lord God be thanked for all his dealings with us! My son, Sergeant
Locke, died well for England, Queen, and Duty."
Nervously fingering the treasure on his breast, the old soldier wheeled
about, and marched proudly straight down the middle of the village
street to his lonely cabin.
The villagers never saw him in life again. Next day he did not appear.
All refrained from intruding on his mourning. But in the evening, when
the Anglican minister heard of his parishioner's loss, he walked to old
John's home.
There, stretched upon his straw bed, he lay in his antique regimentals,
stiffer than At Attention, all his medals fastened below that of
Waterloo above his quiet heart. His right hand lay on an open Bible,
and his face wore an expression as of looking for ever and ever upon
Sergeant Locke and the Great Commander who takes back unto Him the
heroes He fashions to sweeten the world.
*JOHN BEDELL, U. E. LOYALIST[1]*
[1] The United Empire Loyalists were American Tories who forsook their
homes and property after the Revolution in order to live in Canada under
the British Flag. It is impossible to understand Canadian feeling for
the Crown at the present day without understanding the U. E. Loyalist
spirit, which, though Canadians are not now unfriendly to the United
States, is still the most important political force in the Dominion, and
holds it firmly in allegiance to the Crown.
"A renegade! A rebel against his king! A black-hearted traitor! You
dare to tell me that you love George Winthrop! Son of canting, lying
Ezra Winthrop! By the Eternal, I'll shoot him on sight if he comes this
side!"
While old John Bedell was speaking, he tore and flung away a letter,
reached for his long rifle on its pins above the chimney-place, dashed
its butt angrily to the floor, and poured powder into his palm.
"For Heaven's sake, father! You would not! You could not! The war is
over. It would be murder!" cried Ruth Bedell, sobbing.
"Wouldn't I?" He poured the powder in. "Yes, by gracious, quicker'n I'd
kill a rattlesnake!" He placed the round bullet on the little square of
greased rag at the muzzle of his rifle. "A rank traitor--bone and blood
of those who drove out loyal men!"--he crowded the tight lead home,
dashed the ramrod into place, looked to the flint. "Rest there,--wake
up for George Winthrop!" and the fierce old man replaced rifle and
powder-horn on their pegs.
Bedell's hatred for the foes who had beaten down King George's cause,
and imposed the alternative of confiscation or the oath of allegiance on
the vanquished, was considered intense, even by his brother Loyalists of
the Niagara frontier.
"The Squire kind o' sees his boys' blood when the sky's red," said they
in explanation. But Bedell was so much an enthusiast that he could
almost rejoice because his three stark sons had gained the prize of
death in battle. He was too brave to hate the fighting-men he had so
often confronted; but he abhorred the politicians, especially the
intimate civic enemies on whom he had poured scorn before the armed
struggle began. More than any he hated Ezra Winthrop, the lawyer,
arch-revolutionist of their native town, who had never used a weapon but
his tongue. And now his Ruth, the beloved and only child left to his
exiled age, had confessed her love for Ezra Winthrop's son! They had
been boy and girl, pretty maiden and bright stripling together, without
the Squire suspecting--he could not, even now, conceive clearly so wild
a thing as their affection! The confession burned in his heart like
veritable fire,--a raging anguish of mingled loathing and love. He
stood now gazing at Ruth dumbly, his hands clenched, head sometimes
mechanically quivering, anger, hate, love, grief, tumultuous in his
soul.
Ruth glanced up--her father seemed about to speak--she bowed again,
shuddering as though the coming words might kill. Still there was
silence,--a long silence. Bedell stood motionless, poised, breathing
hard--the silence oppressed the girl--each moment her terror
increased--expectant attention became suffering that demanded his
voice--and still was silence--save for the dull roar of Niagara that
more and more pervaded the air. The torture of waiting for the words--a
curse against her, she feared--overwore Ruth's endurance. She looked up
suddenly, and John Bedell saw in hers the beloved eyes of his dead wife,
shrinking with intolerable fear. He groaned heavily. flung up his hands
despairingly, and strode out toward the river.
How crafty smooth the green Niagara sweeps toward the plunge beneath
that perpetual white cloud above the Falls! From Bedell's clearing
below Navy Island, two miles above the Falls, he could see the swaying
and rolling of the mist, ever rushing up to expand and overhang. The
terrible stream had a profound fascination for him, with its racing
eddies eating at the shore; its long weeds, visible through the clear
water, trailing close down to the bottom; its inexorable, eternal,
onward pouring. Because it was so mighty and so threatening, he
rejoiced grimly in the awful river. To float, watching cracks and
ledges of its flat bottom-rock drift quickly upward; to bend to his oars
only when white crests of the rapids yelled for his life; to win escape
by sheer strength from points so low down that he sometimes doubted but
the greedy forces had been tempted too long; to stake his life, watching
tree-tops for a sign that he could yet save it, was the dreadful pastime
by which Bedell often quelled passionate promptings to revenge his
exile. "The Falls is bound to get the Squire, some day," said the
banished settlers. But the Squire's skiff was clean built as a
pickerel, and his old arms iron-strong. Now when he had gone forth from
the beloved child, who seemed to him so traitorous to his love and all
loyalty, he went instinctively to spend his rage upon the river.
Ruth Bedell, gazing at the loaded rifle, shuddered, not with dread only,
but a sense of having been treacherous to her father. She had not told
him all the truth. George Winthrop himself, having made his way
secretly through the forest from Lake Ontario, had given her his own
letter asking leave from the Squire to visit his newly made cabin. From
the moment of arrival her lover had implored her to fly with him. But
filial love was strong in Ruth to give hope that her father would yield
to the yet stronger affection freshened in her heart. Believing their
union might be permitted, she had pledged herself to escape with her
lover if it were forbidden. Now he waited by the hickory wood for a
signal to conceal himself or come forward.
When Ruth saw her father far down the river, she stepped to the
flagstaff he had raised before building the cabin--his first duty being
to hoist the Union Jack! It was the largest flag he could procure; he
could see it flying defiantly all day long; at night he could hear its
glorious folds whipping in the wind; the hot old Loyalist loved to fancy
his foeman cursing at it from the other side, nearly three miles away.
Ruth hauled the flag down a little, then ran it up to the mast-head
again.
At that, a tall young fellow came springing into the clearing, jumping
exultantly over brush-heaps and tree-trunks, his queue waggling, his
eyes bright, glad, under his three-cornered hat. Joying that her father
had yielded, he ran forward till he saw Ruth's tears.
"What, sweetheart!--crying? It was the signal to come on," cried he.
"Yes; to see you sooner, George. Father is out yonder. But no, he will
never, never consent."
"Then you will come with me, love," he said, taking her hands.
"No, no; I dare not," sobbed Ruth. "Father would overtake us. He
swears to shoot you on sight! Go, George! Escape while you can! Oh, if
he should find you here!"
"But, darling love, we need not fear. We can escape easily. I know the
forest path. But--" Then he thought how weak her pace.
"We might cross here before he could come up!" cried Winthrop, looking
toward where the Squire's boat was now a distant blotch.
"No, no," wailed Ruth, yet yielding to his embrace. "This is the last
time I shall see you forever and forever. Go, dear,--good-bye, my love,
my love."
But he clasped her in his strong arms, kissing, imploring, cheering
her,--and how should true love choose hopeless renunciation?
* * * * *
Tempting, defying, regaining his lost ground, drifting down again,
trying hard to tire out and subdue his heart-pangs, Bedell dallied with
death more closely than ever. He had let his skiff drift far down
toward the Falls. Often he could see the wide smooth curve where the
green volume first lapses vastly on a lazy slope, to shoulder up below
as a huge calm billow, before pitching into the madness of waves whose
confusion of tossing and tortured crests hurries to the abyss. The
afternoon grew toward evening before he pulled steadily home, crawling
away from the roarers against the cruel green, watching the ominous
cloud with some such grim humor as if under observation by an
overpowering but baffled enemy.
Approaching his landing, a shout drew Bedell's glance ashore to a group
of men excitedly gesticulating. They seemed motioning him to watch the
American shore. Turning, he saw a boat in midstream, where no craft
then on the river, except his own skiff, could be safe, unless manned by
several good men. Only two oars were flashing. Bedell could make out
two figures indistinctly. It was clear they were doomed,--though still
a full mile above the point whence he had come, they were much farther
out than he when near the rapids. Yet one life might be saved!
Instantly Bedell's bow turned outward, and cheers flung to him from
ashore.
At that moment he looked to his own landing-place, and saw that his
larger boat was gone. Turning again, he angrily recognized it, but kept
right on--he must try to rescue even a thief. He wondered Ruth had not
prevented the theft, but had no suspicion of the truth. Always he had
refused to let her go out upon the river--mortally fearing it for her.
Thrusting his skiff mightily forward,--often it glanced, half-whirled by
up-whelming and spreading spaces of water,--the old Loyalist's heart was
quit of his pangs, and sore only with certainty that he must abandon one
human soul to death. By the time that he could reach the larger boat
his would be too near the rapids for escape with three!
When George Winthrop saw Bedell in pursuit, he bent to his ash-blades
more strongly, and Ruth, trembling to remember her father's threats,
urged her lover to speed. They feared the pursuer only, quite
unconscious that they were in the remorseless grasp of the river. Ruth
had so often seen her father far lower down than they had yet drifted
that she did not realize the truth, and George, a stranger in the
Niagara district, was unaware of the length of the cataracts above the
Falls. He was also deceived by the stream's treacherous smoothness, and
instead of half-upward, pulled straight across, as if certainly able to
land anywhere he might touch the American shore.
Bedell looked over his shoulder often. When he distinguished a woman,
he put on more force, but slackened soon--the pull home would tax his
endurance, he reflected. In some sort it was a relief to know that one
was a woman; he had been anticipating trouble with two men equally bent
on being saved. That the man would abandon himself bravely, the Squire
took as a matter of course. For a while he thought of pulling with the
woman to the American shore, more easily to be gained from the point
where the rescue must occur. But he rejected the plan, confident he
could win back, for he had sworn never to set foot on that soil unless
in war. Had it been possible to save both, he would have been forced to
disregard that vow; but the Squire knew that it was impossible for him
to reach the New York shore with two passengers--two would overload his
boat beyond escape. Man or woman--one must go over the Falls.
Having carefully studied landmarks for his position, Bedell turned to
look again at the doomed boat, and a well-known ribbon caught his
attention! The old man dropped his oars, confused with horror. "My
God, my God! it's Ruth!" he cried, and the whole truth came with another
look, for he had not forgotten George Winthrop.
"Your father stops, Ruth. Perhaps he is in pain," said George to the
quaking girl.
She looked back. "What can it be?" she cried, filial love returning
overmasteringly.
"Perhaps he is only tired." George affected carelessness,--his first
wish was to secure his bride,--and pulled hard away to get all advantage
from Bedell's halt.
"Tired! He is in danger of the Falls, then!" screamed Ruth. "Stop!
Turn! Back to him!"
Winthrop instantly prepared to obey. "Yes, darling," he said, "we must
not think of ourselves. We must go back to save him!" Yet his was a
sore groan at turning; what Duty ordered was so hard,--he must give up
his love for the sake of his enemy.
But while Winthrop was still pulling round, the old Loyalist resumed
rowing, with a more rapid stroke that soon brought him alongside.
In those moments of waiting, all Bedell's life, his personal hatreds,
his loves, his sorrows, had been reviewed before his soul. He had seen
again his sons, the slain in battle, in the pride of their young might;
and the gentle eyes of Ruth had pleaded with him beneath his dead wife's
brow. Into those beloved, unforgotten, visionary eyes he looked with an
encouraging, strengthening gaze,--now that the deed to be done was as
clear before him as the face of Almighty God. In accepting it the
darker passions that had swayed his stormy life fell suddenly away from
their hold on his soul. How trivial had been old disputes! how good at
heart old well-known civic enemies! how poor seemed hate! how mean and
poor seemed all but Love and Loyalty!
Resolution and deep peace had come upon the man.
The lovers wondered at his look. No wrath was there. The old eyes were
calm and cheerful, a gentle smile flickered about his lips. Only that
he was very pale, Ruth would have been wholly glad for the happy change.
"Forgive me, father," she cried, as he laid hand on their boat.
"I do, my child," he answered. "Come now without an instant's delay to
me."
"Oh, father, if you would let us be happy!" cried Ruth, heart-torn by
two loves.
"Dear, you shall be happy. I was wrong, child; I did not understand how
you loved him. But come! You hesitate! Winthrop, my son, you are in
some danger. Into this boat instantly! both of you! Take the oars,
George. Kiss me, dear, my Ruth, once more. Good-bye, my little girl.
Winthrop, be good to her. And may God bless you both forever!"
As the old Squire spoke, he stepped into the larger boat, instantly
releasing the skiff. His imperative gentleness had secured his object
without loss of time, and the boats were apart with Winthrop's readiness
to pull.
"Now row! Row for her life to yonder shore! Bow well up! Away, or the
Falls will have her!" shouted Bedell.
"But you!" cried Winthrop, bending for his stroke. Yet he did not
comprehend Bedell's meaning. Till the last the old man had spoken
without strong excitement. Dread of the river was not on George; his
bliss was supreme in his thought, and he took the Squire's order for one
of exaggerated alarm.
"Row, I say, with all your strength!" cried Bedell, with a flash of
anger that sent the young fellow away instantly. "Row! Concern
yourself not for me. I am going home. Row! for her life, Winthrop!
God will deliver you yet. Good-bye, children. Remember always my
blessing is freely given you."
"God bless and keep you forever, father!" cried Ruth, from the distance,
as her lover pulled away.
They landed, conscious of having passed a swift current, indeed, but
quite unthinking of the price paid for their safety. Looking back on
the darkling river, they saw nothing of the old man.
"Poor father!" sighed Ruth, "how kind he was! I'm sore-hearted for
thinking of him at home, so lonely."
Left alone in the clumsy boat, Bedell stretched with the long, heavy
oars for his own shore, making appearance of strong exertion. But when
he no longer feared that his children might turn back with sudden
understanding, and vainly, to his aid, he dragged the boat slowly,
watching her swift drift down--down toward the towering mist. Then as
he gazed at the cloud, rising in two distinct volumes, came a thought
spurring the Loyalist spirit in an instant. He was not yet out of
American water! Thereafter he pulled steadily, powerfully, noting
landmarks anxiously, studying currents, considering always their trend
to or from his own shore. Half an hour had gone when he again dropped
into slower motion. Then he could see Goat Island's upper end between
him and the mist of the American Fall.
Now the old man gave himself up to intense curiosity, looking over into
the water with fascinated inquiry. He had never been so far down the
river. Darting beside their shadows, deep in the clear flood, were now
larger fishes than he had ever taken, and all moved up as if hurrying to
escape. How fast the long trailing, swaying, single weeds, and the
crevices in flat rock whence they so strangely grew, went up stream and
away as if drawn backward. The sameness of the bottom to that higher up
interested him--where then _did_ the current begin to sweep clean? He
should certainly know that soon, he thought, without a touch of fear,
having utterly accepted death when he determined it were base to carry
his weary old life a little longer, and let Ruth's young love die. Now
the Falls' heavy monotone was overborne by terrible sounds--a mingled
clashing, shrieking, groaning, and rumbling, as of great bowlders
churned in their beds.
Bedell was nearing the first long swoop downward at the rapids' head
when those watching him from the high bank below the Chippewa River's
mouth saw him put his boat stern with the current and cease rowing
entirely, facing fairly the up-rushing mist to which he was being
hurried. Then they observed him stooping, as if writing, for a time.
Something flashed in his hands, and then he knelt with head bowed down.
Kneeling, they prayed, too.
Now he was almost on the brink of the cascades. Then he arose, and,
glancing backward to his home, caught sight of his friends on the high
shore. Calmly he waved a farewell. What then? Thrice round he flung
his hat, with a gesture they knew full well. Some had seen that
exultant waving in front of ranks of battle. As clearly as though the
roar of waters had not drowned his ringing voice, they knew that old
John Bedell, at the poise of death, cheered thrice, "Hurrah! Hurrah!
Hurrah for the King!"
They found his body a week afterward, floating with the heaving water in
the gorge below the Falls. Though beaten almost out of recognition,
portions of clothing still adhered to it, and in a waistcoat pocket they
found the old Loyalist's metal snuff-box, with this inscription
scratched by knife-point on the cover: "God be praised, I die in British
waters! JOHN BEDELL."
*OLD MAN SAVARIN*
Old Ma'ame Paradis had caught seventeen small dore, four suckers, and
eleven channel-catfish before she used up all the worms in her
tomato-can. Therefore she was in a cheerful and loquacious humor when I
came along and offered her some of my bait.
"Merci; non, M'sieu. Dat's 'nuff fishin' for me. I got too old now for
fish too much. You like me make you present of six or seven dore? Yes?
All right. Then you make me present of one quarter dollar."
When this transaction was completed, the old lady got out her short
black clay pipe, and filled it with _tabac blanc_.
"Ver' good smell for scare mosquitoes," said she. "Sit down, M'sieu.
For sure I like to be here, me, for see the river when she's like this."
Indeed the scene was more than picturesque. Her fishing-platform
extended twenty feet from the rocky shore of the great Rataplan Rapid of
the Ottawa, which, beginning to tumble a mile to the westward, poured a
roaring torrent half a mile wide into the broader, calm brown reach
below. Noble elms towered on the shores. Between their trunks we could
see many whitewashed cabins, whose doors of blue or green, or red
scarcely disclosed their colors in that light.
The sinking sun, which already touched the river, seemed somehow the
source of the vast stream that flowed radiantly from its blaze. Through
the glamour of the evening mist and the maze of June flies we could see
a dozen men scooping for fish from platforms like that of Ma'ame
Paradis.
Each scooper lifted a great hoop-net set on a handle some fifteen feet
long, threw it easily up stream, and swept it on edge with the current
to the full length of his reach. Then it was drawn out and at once
thrown upward again, if no capture had been made. In case he had taken
fish, he came to the inshore edge of his platform, and upset the net's
contents into a pool separated from the main rapid by an improvised wall
of stones.
"I'm too old for scoop some now," said Ma'ame Paradis, with a sigh.
"You were never strong enough to scoop, surely," said I.
"No, eh? All right, M'sieu. Then you hain't nev' hear 'bout the time
Old Man Savarin was catched up with. No, eh? Well, I'll tol' you 'bout
that." And this was her story as she told it to me.
* * * * *